When I finally figured out how to get my butane torch to work on making sterling silver ball head pins, I went hog wild. My heart skips a beat when I see that silver melt into a little ball and start crawling up the wire. (I LOVE FIRE.) I already had a pile of my steel "barbed wire" rings (with which I had also gone hog wild), and had an idea. I've seen other metalsmiths do amazing things with double ended ball heapdins, wrapping them hither and yon onto their jewelry to make really stunning pieces, and I thought I would wrap such things onto my barbed wire rings to make all manner of jewelry components. I love the dark annealed steel with sterling silver.
The earrings below were originally intended to be connectors in a necklace with a larger, similar component for the pendant, but there was just too much going on. They became
earrings instead. The pendant was awaiting some pewter beads from
Happy Mango Beads, which I got today in the mail. So hopefully the pendant will be strung and completed tomorrow.
I will probably do this again with copper (unless you all say "Um, WTF?"), once I get my propane torch going. It's still in the box in the bag. I'm a little chicken. I'm not going to say I'll fire it up this weekend because I said that last weekend and I think the weekend before that. I'm just going to wait for the propane to call my name.
